


No.27 (Alt6) Don't Try To Pin This on Me

by LiGi



Series: Febuwhump 2021 [27]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Banter, Don't try to pin this on me, FebuWhump2021, Gen, Hurt Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Name-Calling, Trapped, just 2k of merlin and arthur bitching at each other, lovable idiots, no 27, prat and idiot, that's pretty much it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:49:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29761974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiGi/pseuds/LiGi
Summary: Febuwhump 2021 day 27 - Alt6 - "Don't try to pin this on me!"While out in the forest, Merlin and Arthur, idiots that they are, manage to get caught in a pitfall trap.
Relationships: Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Series: Febuwhump 2021 [27]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2137632
Comments: 2
Kudos: 33





	No.27 (Alt6) Don't Try To Pin This on Me

**Author's Note:**

> Unbetaed, because I didn't get it done in time to send to the lovely Onehelluvapilot.  
> This was one of those fics that just poured out of my head without any input from me... it's just 2k of Merlin and Arthur bitching at each other basically, enjoy...

“And then Gwaine said ‘I bet you couldn’t do it after drinking four tankards of ale’,” Merlin said, lowering his voice and trying to match Gwaine’s accent. “So, of course, Elyan ordered another round and –”

“What’s that?” Arthur asked suddenly, cutting across Merlin’s chatter and pointing at something at the side of the path.

“What’s what?” Merlin asked, looking where Arthur was pointing. “Don’t you want to hear the rest of the story?”

“No.”

“It’s really funny, Percival and Elyan ended up getting thrown out of the tavern.” Merlin chuckled.

“I don’t care,” Arthur said grumpily. He stalked off the path and bent down to pick something up. Merlin peered over Arthur’s shoulder as he turned, flipping a copper coin between his fingers.

“Like you don’t have enough of those already,” Merlin scoffed as Arthur closed his fist around the coin.

But Arthur ignored him, pointing down at a large very obvious boot print in the mud, and another slightly further on. He began following the prints, every now and then bending to snatch up another coin.

“Arthur…” Merlin shook his head. “Does this seem a little odd to you?”

“Of course it does,” Arthur answered impatiently. “It’s a trail of coins in the middle of the forest.”

“Well… you don’t think that seems a bit like a trap?”

“Merlin, you are so suspicious.” Arthur made a ‘ _tsk_ ’ noise with his tongue. “It might be someone who needs help.”

“If we get caught by bandits, I am not going to let you live it down,” Merlin muttered, plodding after Arthur as he tracked the footprints deeper into the trees.

After several dozen yards and a handful more copper coins, Arthur stopped, his hand raised. Merlin tripped, stumbled forwards and bumped into Arthur, then suddenly the ground in front of Arthur gave way and they were both falling. What Merlin had taken for a pile of fallen branches was actually a cleverly concealed pitfall trap.

They hit the bottom with a thud and a crunch and a yelp. Pain exploded across Merlin’s hip and side where he’d landed heavily and the breath was knocked out of him. Arthur groaned, collapsing sideways and grasping his ankle.

“Oh, well this is just great!” Merlin gasped as he got his breath back. They were at the bottom of a deep pit, dead branches and copper coins scattered around them. Arthur was bent over his ankle, breathing heavily through his teeth. He groaned and reached out to smack Merlin.

“Hey, what was that for?!”

“We’re in a bloody pit!” Arthur shouted, his voice loud against the deadened quiet of the earth walls around them.

“Well, maybe if you’d listened to me in the first place, you stupid cabbage head, we wouldn’t be,” he shouted back.

“Stop being a smart arse, Merlin. You’ve already got us into enough trouble today.”

“Oh no, no, no! Don’t try to pin this on me! You’re the one that wanted to follow the bloody trail of coins… that, I think you’ll remember, I pointed out looked like a trap!”

“You _pushed_ me in!” Arthur said indignantly. “I’ve never known someone so uselessly clumsy in all of my life!”

He let out a huge huff, then sagged back against the side of the hole and shut his eyes. Merlin sighed, releasing as much of his annoyance as he could in one long breath. Then he turned to Arthur.

“Are you alright?”

“I think I’ve broken my ankle,” he replied quietly.

Merlin scooted closer to him, sliding his boot off and gently prodding around his ankle. It was swollen and red and Arthur hissed when he touched it but nothing felt broken. Nevertheless, he untied the knot of his neckerchief and began wrapping the cloth as tightly as he could around Arthur’s ankle and foot to hold it in place and put pressure on it.

“This is my favourite neckerchief, you know,” Merlin told him as he tied the ends of the red cloth securely around his foot.

“I’ll get you a new one,” Arthur said dismissively. “A nicer one.”

Merlin raised his eyebrows, but Arthur wasn’t looking at him to notice.

“Alright, I don’t think it’s broken, just sprained, so do you think you can try to stand up?”

Arthur groaned, but held his hand out to Merlin. Merlin stood, gripped his wrist and pulled him upright. Arthur leant heavily against the side, lifting his injured foot off the ground. He looked up to the top of the hole five feet above their heads.

“We need to get out of here before whoever dug this trap comes back.”

Merlin nodded. He chewed his lip. He could easily get them out using magic, but that definitely wouldn’t go down well and he didn’t think now was the best time to reveal his secret to Arthur. They could climb, but the walls looked like they might just crumble if they tried to make hand or foot holes. He could only really see one option.

“Here,” he started, pulling Arthur away from the wall. “Hold my shoulder.” He positioned one of Arthur’s hands on his shoulder. “Right, this will hurt but you have to stand on your bad foot and put your good foot here.” He cupped his hands in front of him, bending down so they were level with Arthur’s knees.

Arthur’s mouth dropped open and his hand slid off of Merlin’s shoulder. “You’re joking?” he said.

“No.” Merlin shook his head. “I’ll give you a boost up, you grab the edge and pull yourself out.”

“Merlin, there is no way you can lift me,” Arthur said in exasperation.

“Well, if you weren’t so fat,” Merlin said playfully. Arthur smacked him hard around the back of the head.

“I am _not_ fat!”

“You’re the one that said I couldn’t lift you.”

“Yes, because you’re so scrawny. Look at you!” He wrapped his hand around Merlin’s bicep, squeezing it.

Merlin swatted him away, giving him a shove. Arthur fell back against the dirt side of the hole.

“OI! Don’t push me!” he shouted, trying to shove Merlin in return but Merlin dodged away.

“Stronger than I look,” Merlin retorted with a smirk.

“I still don’t think you can lift me.”

“I’m not going to lift you, I’m just boosting you. Your _mighty_ strength is doing most of the work.”

Arthur gave him a look. Merlin tried not to laugh. He bent to make the step with his hands again but Arthur made no move to climb.

“Here, help me with this.” He began scrabbling his fingers against the buckle holding his pauldron instead.

“Now what are you doing?” Merlin asked in confusion.

“Getting rid of some excess weight.”

“That’s really not going to make that much difference, Arthur.” But he helped him remove the pauldron anyway. “It’s the excess weight on your arse that’s the problem.”

“One more joke about me being fat, Merlin…” Arthur threatened, jabbing a finger at Merlin’s face.

Merlin just smirked. Arthur made a disgusted sound at the back of his throat and thrust his pauldron into Merlin’s stomach. Merlin dropped it to the floor and began unbuckling his gorget as well. Once that was also off, Arthur removed his belt and let Merlin yank his chainmail over his head.

“Right, now let’s try,” Arthur said, dumping his chainmail on top of the pile of his armour and fastening his sword belt back around his waist.

Merlin bent, cupped his hands and braced his knees to take Arthur’s weight. Arthur hissed, balancing on his bad ankle and put his good foot on Merlin’s hands.

“One, two, three!” Merlin hoisted Arthur upwards, his eyes shining as he added a little magical strength to his boost to make sure Arthur’s hands reached the top of the hole. He got a good firm hold on the ground above and dragged himself up with his arms.

“Yes!” Merlin cheered quietly to himself, rubbing his hip which had started throbbing painfully as he’d stood up.

He could hear Arthur swearing and muttering in pain and then he leant over the edge to peer down at Merlin. Merlin beamed at him but Arthur just scowled.

“I’ve half a mind to just leave you there,” he said with a smirk.

“Oh, well that’s just charming!” Merlin shouted up at him grumpily. “Thank you, sire, so bloody grateful.”

“Stop whinging. I wouldn’t really.” Arthur rolled his eyes.

“No, because you’d never make it back to Camelot without me anyway.”

“I would.”

“On that ankle?”

“Shut up, Merlin.”

Merlin huffed. His hip was really starting to hurt in earnest now and he was getting grumpier than ever.

“Go and find something to pull me up with,” he ordered.

“I give the orders around here…” Arthur complained, but he disappeared from view as he presumably went to do as Merlin had said anyway.

Merlin sighed, leaning against the edge of the hole and massaging his side. It felt like he was going to have a huge bruise right from the bottom of his ribs all the way to his thigh. He really had landed flat on his side when he fell. Maybe Arthur would let him have tomorrow off…

A few minutes later, Arthur’s face appeared at the top of the hole again.

“Here!”

He threw down one end of a thick trailing vine.

“It’s got bloody thorns on it!” Merlin shouted indignantly.

“Sorry, it’s the best I could find,”

Huffing again, Merlin snapped a few thorns off the vine then wound it around his hands. Luckily the thorns were fairly widely spaced apart so he managed to get a pretty good grip and only stabbed himself once.

“Ready,” he called up to Arthur.

“Wait, what about my things.” He pointed down to his chainmail, armour and his one discarded boot. “That’s my favourite chainmail.”

“Really?” Merlin gave him a look. Arthur had four shirts of mail, and they all looked exactly the same, except for the ceremonial one. There was no way the prat could possibly know which was which or have a favourite one.

“Bring it up.” Arthur waved a hand exaggeratedly. “We can’t leave it there for a bandit to find,” he added reasonably. Merlin grunted; that was a good point.

“Alright, catch!”

He unlooped the vine from his hand and stooped to pick up Arthur’s boot, chucking it up at the prince’s face. With a yelp, Arthur ducked out of the way, but caught the boot and dumped it on the ground beside him. Merlin quickly followed with the pauldron and gorget. Arthur was grumbling and Merlin gave a satisfied smirk.

He slung the chainmail over his shoulder, tucking one sleeve into the front of his belt so it wouldn’t slide off. He stretched out his aching back, then wound the vine around his hand again.

“Ready this time?” he asked Arthur.

“Yes. Hold on tight.”

Arthur grunted as he began hauling the vine upwards, shuffling back to get more purchase. Slowly, Merlin was dragged out of the hole. He dug his toes into the sides of the dirt walls, putting magic into each kick of his feet to push himself upwards. Eventually the tension of the vine slackened a little and he felt hands grab his jacket, yanking him up and over the edge.

He collapsed next to Arthur and both of them lay panting for a few moments.

“Alright…” Arthur let his hand fall onto Merlin’s stomach heavily. Merlin let out a little ‘oof’. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Yes…” Merlin agreed. “That’s not a bad idea.”

**Author's Note:**

> I love any and all comments!


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